Scores On This Historic Day

September 1, 1872: Al Thake drowns in a fishing accident off Fort Hamilton in Brooklyn. The left fielder for the Brooklyn Atlantics was only 22 years old. This was the 1st time that an active professional baseball player had died. Ten years earlier, James Creighton, one of the top amateur players, died as a result of an in-game injury in Brooklyn. Albert Thake was born on September 21, 1849, in Wymondham, Norfolk, England.  His family moved to Brooklyn  during his youth. Like many boys born in England but raised in America, Albert switched from his original country's game of cricket to his new country's game of baseball. He  played for the Star Club of Brooklyn, before moving on to the Atlantics. He made his National Association debut on June 13, 1872, going 1-for-5 in an Atlantic loss to the Baltimore Canaries. He played in 18 games, batting .295 with 15 RBIs, not bad at all for a player approaching his 23rd birthday, in any era. On August 28, in a loss to the original versio

August 31, 2021: President Joe Biden removes the last American combat troops from Afghanistan, 20 years after they were first sent there. George W. Bush sent the first American troops there in October 2001, in response to the terrorist attacks of the preceding September 11. They managed to corner Osama bin Laden, but Bush never gave the order to finish the job, and bin Laden escaped. And that left Americans with a quagmire, in which staying in Afghanistan began to seem like a worse and worse idea over the years, but getting out seemed like an even worse one: We couldn't abandon those people to the Taliban we had previously kicked out of power. Bush wouldn't take the troops out. Barack Obama wouldn't. Donald Trump decided he didn't want to help brown-skinned Muslims, and put in place a timetable for taking the troops out. Biden decided that following that timetable was the least bad idea. And then the Republicans, in Congress and in the media, ripped Biden for doing wha

August 31, 1997: I woke up in the middle of the night, turned on the TV, and found out that Princess Diana had been in a car crash in Paris. Her post-Prince Charles boyfriend, Dodi al-Fayed, had already been announced as dead. The newscasters didn’t reveal her condition, and may not have known it. But I had a feeling she wouldn’t make it. And she didn’t. She was 36. Diana Frances Spencer was born on July 1, 1961, in Sandringham, Norfolk, England, not far from one of the royal family's retreat homes. The Spencers and the Windsors had known each other for decades, and it wasn't a total surprise to "royal-watchers" when, at 19, Diana, then a teacher, was engaged to Charles, Prince of Wales, then 31. They married on July 29, 1981, in a wedding ceremony televised around the world. Prince William was born the following year; Prince Harry, 2 years after that. But, as she put it, there were 3 people in the marriage. Prince Charles' true love was Lady Camilla Parker-Bowle

August 31, 1994: The Russian Federation pulls the last of its armed forces out of the "Baltic States": Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. These countries had gained their independence from the Russian Empire after World War I, but it didn't last. On September 28, 1939, under threat of invasion, Estonia signed a treaty of "mutual assistance" with the Soviet Union, which allowed the establishment of Soviet military bases there. Latvia, under similar duress, did so on October 5; Lithuania, on October 10. On June 14, 1940, the day the Nazis marched into Paris, the Soviets issued an ultimatum to Lithuania, demanding t he replacement of the Lithuanian government, and that the Red Army  be allowed into the country. The government decided that, with Soviet bases already in Lithuania, armed resistance was impossible and accepted the ultimatum. The Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic was incorporated into the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on August 3, 1940; the Latvia

August 31, 1955: A rare match race between horse racing champions is held at Washington Park in Chicago. Swaps, a horse known as the California Comet, won the 1955 Kentucky Derby in 2 minutes, 1 and 4/5ths seconds, just 2/5ths shy of the race record, since broken by Secretariat in 1973. He was ridden by Willie Shoemaker, who retired as the jockey with the most races won in a career. But an injured hoof prevented Swaps from running in the last 2 legs of the Triple Crown, the Preakness Stakes and the Belmont Stakes. Nashua was bred and trained in Maryland, and ridden by the other great jockey of the 1950s, Eddie Arcaro. The leading 2-year-old racer the year before, Nashua was the favorite to win the Kentucky Derby, but finished 2nd to Swaps. Nashua won the Preakness Stakes, by only 1 length, but in a track record, also broken by Secretariat 18 years later. Nashua won the Belmont Stakes by 9 lengths, and certainly looked like the best thoroughbred horse in the country. But some racing ob

August 31, 1934:  The 1st Chicago Tribune Charities College All-Star Game is played at Soldier Field. Like the Major League Baseball All-Star Game, first played the year before at Chicago's Comiskey Park, it was the idea of Chicago Tribune sports editor Arch Ward, in connection with the 1933-34 "Century of Progress" World's Fair. Unlike the All-Star Game, it was set for Chicago every year. In 1943 and 1944, it was held at Dyche Stadium (now Ryan Field), in nearby Evanston, Illinois, home field of Northwestern University. Other than those 2, it was always played at Soldier Field. The format of "the Chicago College All-Star Game" was always the same: An all-star team of recently graduated college players would play the defending NFL Champions. In this case, the Chicago Bears, featuring Harold "Red" Grange, the template for all speedy halfbacks who followed him; and Bronislau "Bronko" Nagurski, the role model for all big, bruising fullback

Left to right: Cynthia Cooper, Tina Thompson, Sheryl Swoopes August 30, 1997: The 1st WNBA Championship is awarded. Instead of a series, as it is today, it is a single game, at the Compaq Center -- formerly The Summit -- in Houston, and the Houston Comets beat the New York Liberty, 65-51. Despite having such stars as Rebecca Lobo, Teresa Weatherspoon, Kym Hampton and Rutgers graduate Sue Wicks, the Libs couldn't keep up with Sheryl Swoopes and Cynthia Cooper -- "Swoopes to the Hoop" and "Coop to the Hoop." Cooper led all scorers with 25 points, and was named the game's Most Valuable Player. Under head coach Van Chancellor, the Rockets won the WNBA's 1st 4 Championships. In comparison, Houston's other teams combined have won 5: The Rockets 2, MLS' Dynamo 2, the Astros 1, the Texans none and the Oilers none. (This does not count the AFL Championships won by the Oilers in 1960 and '61, or the WHA Championships won by the Aeros in 1974 and '

August 30, 1972: The "One To One Concert" is held at Madison Square Garden in Midtown Manhattan. It is a benefit for developmentally disabled children. The headliners are John Lennon and Yoko Ono. The former Beatle was asked to do it by journalist Geraldo Rivera, as a benefit for the children at Willowbrook State School on Staten Island in New York City. Rivera, in his first big scoop as a journalist, had exposed abuses of the children there. Lennon had seen Rivera's report on WABC-Channel 7, and contacted him about the story. Rivera asked him to do a benefit concert, he agreed, and Rivera introduced him. There were actually 2 concerts at The Garden that day, an afternoon show and an evening show. Among the other performers were Stevie Wonder, Roberta Flack and the doo-wop tribute group Sha Na Na. The concerts were filmed and recorded, and later served as the basis for the live album Live in New York City , released in 1986. Backed by the band Elephant's Memory, John

August 30, 1967: President Lyndon B. Johnson appoints Thurgood Marshall to the Supreme Court of the United States. This made him its 1st black Justice. Most new Justices are not familiar to the general public before their appointments. Marshall was: He was a man whose story would have to be told even if he had never received this appointment. He was born on July 2, 1908 in Baltimore. On my 1st visit to that city, in 1987, my hotel was across the street from the Federal Courthouse. Although it was named for the recently-deceased Congressman Edward Garmatz, there was a statue of Marshall outside. It was the 1st time I had ever seen a statue of someone still living. In his case, he was even still serving on the Supreme Court. (Although a check of the facts shows that Garmatz was also still alive when the Courthouse was named for him.) He attended Lincoln University, the country's oldest school for black students, outside Philadelphia in Chester, Pennsylvania, where he was a classmate

August 30, 1963:  The Moscow-Washington Hot Line goes into operation. It was put in place in the wake of the Cuban Missile Crisis the previous year, to make for quicker diplomacy. In American popular culture, the Hot Line usually appears as a red telephone on the desk of the President of the United States. It has never been a phone, it has never been in the White House, and it doesn't link the 2 countries' respective heads of state. Rather, it was originally a Teletype machine, became a fax machine in 1986, and a secure computer link in 2008; and its Washington end is actually across the Potomac River in Arlington, Virginia, at the Pentagon, the headquarters of the U.S. Department of Defense, while the Russian end is in the General Staff Building, home of the Russian Federation's Ministry of Defense. Of course, the respective Presidents do have secure phone lines that they can use to talk directly to each other, through translators. Through August 30, 2022, it has been used

August 30, 1963: The modern audio cassette tape, and the tape recorder that used it, were both introduced to the public by the Philips Company. For the next 30 years, the "cassette" would be the standard form of portable recorded music. Tapes of the latest releases. Blank tapes to make your own recordings, tapes made by Philips. Sony. JVC. Maxell. Going to get them at Crazy Eddie, J&R, or Tower Records if you lived in New York. If you lived in New Jersey, Crazy Eddie was still an option. Or Sam Goody. Or any number of other "record store" chains that are now out of business. Or Woolco or McCrory's or any other of the "five-and-dimes" that were the dollar stores of their time. People who grew up with compact discs, mp3s and iPods will never know the struggle. Trying to rewind or fast-forward to a song you like. Tape getting mangled. Turning it back by sticking a pencil in the hole and turning it. Most of all, calling a radio station, to request tha

Artist's depiction August 30, 1918: An attempt is made to assassinate Vladimir Lenin, leader of the Bolshevik Revolution, and dictator of Russia. Although he does not die immediately, the attempt can be said to have succeeded. Born into a Jewish family, Feiga "Fanny" Kaplan served a sentence of hard labor during the Czarist years for her revolutionary activities. She became  a member of the Socialist Revolutionary Party, and originally supported Lenin. But when the Bolsheviks banned all parties but their own, she began to view him  as a "traitor to the revolution." On August 30, 1918, she approached Lenin, who was leaving a Moscow factory, and fired 3 shots. One bullet passed through his coat. One lodged in his left shoulder. One passed through his neck, punctured part of his left lung, and stopped near his right collarbone. Lenin was taken back to his living quarters at the Kremlin. He feared that others might be planning to kill him, and refused to leave the

Thomas Hicks August 30, 1904:  Perhaps the craziest sporting event ever held on American soil takes place. No movie studio would buy a script containing this story. But it all happened. The 1st modern Olympic Games, in Athens, Greece in 1896, were a smashing success. Not least because its signature event, the marathon race, was won by a Greek, Spyridon Louis, who became, and perhaps remains, his nation's greatest sporting hero. The founder of the International Olympic Committee, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, wanted them held every 4 years, just like they were in ancient Greece. Understandable. And he wanted the next one to be in his hometown: Paris, France. Also understandable, given his role in their establishment, given France's status as one of the world's leading countries, and given Paris' status as one of the world's most beloved cities. But the 1900 Olympics were practically a sideshow to the Exposition Universelle, a World's Fair. It was so haphazard that s